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A Framework to Evaluate the Effects ofOrganizational Resilience on Service Quality

Alessandro Annarelli 1,* , Cinzia Battistella 2 and Fabio Nonino 1

1 Department of Computer, Control and Management Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome,Via Ariosto 25, 00185 Rome, Italy; [email protected]

2 Polytechnic Department of Engineering and Architecture, University of Udine, 33100 Udine, Italy;[email protected]

* Correspondence: [email protected]

Received: 5 December 2019; Accepted: 26 January 2020; Published: 28 January 2020�����������������

Abstract: Disruptions and unexpected turbulences characterize the contemporary service industryand pose greater criticalities to organizations that have concerns about both their survival and theirbusiness sustainability. The answer to this challenge is to design an organizational system aimedat enhancing so-called organizational resilience. The aim of this work is to present and test anassessment methodology based on a framework that links key static and dynamic characteristicsof firms as resilient systems and relates these characteristics with service quality preservation afterdisruptions. The framework adopts a set of indicators, namely resilience dimensions, to comprehendthe real effects of resilience characteristics with service quality dimensions. Through the analysisof a real case, we provided evidence of how the model can be applied in a backward perspectiveto understand fault modes of specific events. Results show how inadequacies in terms of resiliencecharacteristics determine losses of service quality, and also how the model can be used as a predictivetool to determine in which area companies should intervene in order to improve resilience andservice quality.

Keywords: organizational resilience; resilient systems; resilience characteristics; resilience dimensions;service dimensions

1. Introduction

Nowadays, the competitive environment always poses new threats and challenges to firms due toan increased turbulence in markets and industries. In addition, the natural and social environment inwhich companies operate poses a whole series of challenges and threats that can seriously jeopardizethe business operation and continuity: this is the case of natural disasters, terrorism, floods, diseases,economic crises, and recession, as well as mass failures, and breakdowns and malfunctions of physicaland technological systems [1,2].

In this challenging context, companies need to be resilient. Resilience, originally referred to“jumping back” (original meaning from the Latin resiliere) and to the ability of recovery, emergedin academic literature thanks to the work of Holling [3] in the field of ecology and ecosystems.Then resilience studies spread to a multitude of research fields, as a general property of many differentsystems, intended as the ability of resisting to disturbances and recovery [4–9].

For what concerns organizational resilience, we can define as “the organization’s ability toface disruptions and unexpected events thanks to the strategic awareness and a linked operationalmanagement of internal and external shocks” [10]. Furthermore, it is important to highlight twoparticular attributes of resilience coming from its static and dynamic nature. Static resilience ismostly based on preparedness and preventive measures to minimize threats in terms of probability of

Sustainability 2020, 12, 958; doi:10.3390/su12030958 www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability

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occurrence and potential impact, while dynamic resilience is more focused on the effective managementof accidents and unforeseen events to shorten unfavorable aftermaths and maximize the organization’sspeed of recovery [11,12].

Therefore, it is vital for companies to put in action measures for building organizational resilienceto maintain competitiveness and to secure business sustainability. To this extent, the aim of this workis to propose a methodology to evaluate the effectiveness of organizational resilience strategy andrelated actions in the specific context of the service industry. In the general context described above,companies are facing a series of new threats related to cyber-attacks becoming always more relevantand related to the key topics of cyber security and digital transformation [13]. In the past, literature onorganizational resilience focused mostly on product companies and supply chains; however, thereis a need to investigate in greater detail the development of resilience in service companies [14].According to the authors’ knowledge, there is a gap in the literature that concerns the developmentof a set of indicators to evaluate resilience measures put in action in the specific context of servicecompanies. Nowadays, service companies are facing the same types of problems. Building resilience,while maintaining competitiveness and stability of business operations, is a key challenge, and ouraim is therefore proposing and testing a framework that makes explicit linkages between resiliencecharacteristics and service quality preservation after a disruption.

The paper is organized as follows. Section 2 presents the theoretical background of the study.Section 3 describes the framework of analysis and Section 4 presents the case analyzed to test theapplicability of the model. Section 5 contains concluding remarks together with limitations and futureresearch directions.

2. Theoretical Background

2.1. Characteristics of Resilient Systems

Resilience is an intrinsic attribute of systems, and therefore, of companies, nurtured and fosteredby developing a relevant organizational culture, which in turn, also determines the key characteristicsof resilient systems, detailed below. As already reported, it is important to distinguish betweenelements that characterize a static or a dynamic approach to [10–12].

Moving from the literature, we derived seven elements that characterize a static approach (basedon preparation and prevention) and the structural capabilities predicting a resilient organization,namely, (1) continuous monitoring, (2) anticipation ability, (3) redundancy, (4) simulation, (5) initialvulnerability, (6) focus on minor aspects, and (7) learning from mistakes. At the same time, we identifiedtwo key elements that characterize a dynamic approach (focused on timely management of crisis)toward resilience, which are (1) internal communication and (2) improvisational capabilities.

Indeed, as regards to static capabilities for resilience, organizations need to put in action continuousmonitoring efforts, i.e., implementing a set of activities aimed at helping actors to constantly monitororganizational processes and eventually correct and reiterate, through information gathered, the actionstaken [15]. Also, according to Weick and Sutcliffe [15], when talking about anticipation ability, we referto the ability of foreseeing an uncontrolled undesired effect, based on small differences. Followingthis, another key element of resilient systems is redundancy: this term refers to the duplication of thecritical components of a system with the intention of increasing its reliability, in particular for functionsof vital importance to guarantee, for instance, the safety of people and plants or the continuity ofproduction. This can be pursued by ensuring the existence of different means and actors that canperform a specific task arranged in such a way a system failure can occur only as a consequence of thesimultaneous failure of all these means and actors [14]. Another two elements to be taken into accountare simulation and initial vulnerability: the first one relates to the need for companies to conductsimulations and adopt simulation tools in order to be able to predict possible future scenarios andto assess the effectiveness of proposed approaches [16,17]; at the same time, in order to implementmeasures for resilience, organizations need to be aware of their potential vulnerabilities, defined as

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the state of being exposed to the possibility of being attacked or harmed [18]. Together with theunderestimation of information sharing and communication, organizations tend to ignore minor eventsand/or aspects that could act as warning signals. According to Choo [19], “warning signals and eventsare discounted because of values, norms, and priorities that influence the evaluation and interpretationof information, so that no corrective action is taken” and that is why focus on minor aspects should playan important role in building a culture for resilience [20]. Finally, learning from mistakes is related tothe ability of translating lessons learned in a new and adequate operational capacity with a particularreference to mistaken assumptions and actions.

As regards to dynamic capabilities for resilience, internal communication has always played a keyrole in organizations under different lights, e.g., by impacting strategic decision making and strategicplanning [21,22], organizational change [23], and also human resources management by ensuringbranding and employee engagement [24–26]. Accordingly, we consider internal communication as akey characteristic for enabling organizational resilience, since its ability to quickly spread informationwithin companies goes in pair with the ability to respond timely, react, and reconfigure after unexpectedevents and accidents. Therefore, internal communication can be the answer to one of the majorproblems that can usually undermine organizational resilience, i.e., bureaucratic culture and informationdispersion [19,20,27,28]. Improvisational capabilities are defined as “the ability to spontaneouslyreconfigure existing resources to build new operational capabilities to address urgent, unpredictable,and novel environmental situations” [29]. These capabilities refer to the need for companies to copewith turbulent and unpredictable environments, a characteristic that has been widely acknowledged inthe literature as a key requisite for resilience [30].

2.2. Resilience Dimensions

Together with static and dynamic elements of resilient systems, in order to provide a complete andmore immediate qualitative view of organizational resilience, there is a need to define a series of directmeasures on the level of organizational resilience. Past works in the literature extensively discussedthe issue of resilience dimensions. For instance, Bruneau et al. [31] presented four resilience properties,upon which depend four dimensions: the properties of robustness, redundancy, resourcefulness, andrapidity. Robustness is defined as the ability to withstand a certain level of stress without sufferingloss of performance and/or function; redundancy refers to the extent to which elements of a systemare substitutable or replicable; resourcefulness is intended as the ability to mobilize resources andassets to face unexpected events and/or threats; while rapidity concerns “the capacity to meet prioritiesand achieve goals in a timely manner to contain losses and avoid future disruption” ([31], p. 6).Furthermore, Bruneau et al. [31] identified four different dimensions that characterize resilience:technical, social, economic and organizational.

The above model has been reprised and expanded by Fischer et al. [32] who also included theaspects of vulnerability and susceptibility to assess the degree of a system’s resilience: more specifically,susceptibility refers to the frequency of adverse events combined with the exposition of systems tothese events.

Therefore, moving from the analysis of previous contributions, we could identify seven differentareas of resilience evaluation:

1. Adaptability is the ability to adapt to changes, more specifically it has been defined by Stevensonand Spring [33] as the adaptive ability of a system in response to changes in its environment.

2. Reliability is generally defined as the probability that a system fulfils its function satisfactorily,for a specified time interval and under certain operating conditions [15].

3. Agility, defined as the ability of a system to answer and react to changes in uncertain and changingenvironments [34].

4. Effectiveness of resilience actions that according to the Cambridge Dictionary, is the quality ofbeing successful in achieving what is wanted and the ability to produce the intended results.

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5. Flexibility refers to the extent and pace to which organizations adapt to sudden and radicalchanges, and is based on the chance of quickly interchanging elements to perform different taskswithout having to reorganize all of the system’s processes [15].

6. Recovery level can be expressed as the difference between the system’s initial state before themalfunctioning/accident and the restore point, and it can be also compared to a desired recoverylevel in order to assess the performance of specific actions put in place [35,36].

7. Recovery time indicates the time needed by the system and organization to restore its normalstate [35,36].

2.3. Service Dimensions

The methodology proposed takes into account the effects of resilience on the quality of servicesoffered by organizations. Therefore, it is crucial to define a series of dimensions and related indicatorsthat allow evaluating the quality of services. To provide a comprehensive evaluation of serviceprovision process, we decided to adopt a subset of service evaluation model proposed by Parasuramanet al. [37,38], based on the concept of perceived quality, defined as the judgement of consumers aboutthe overall excellence of an [39]. Linked to this concept, there are four key aspects to be considered,which are the comparison of perceived quality versus objective quality [40,41]; the concept of quality asattitude [42]; the conceptual gap between quality and satisfaction [37,43], since consumers’ satisfactioncan be achieved even if the perceived quality is low; and the difference between expectations comparedto perceptions that represent a direct measure of the perceived quality notion [37,44,45].

Following the above points/reflections, the proposed model presents a subset of six dimensionsthat reflect the overall quality of services, which are [37]:

• Competence: possession of the required skills and knowledge to deliver a service.• Access: includes approachability and ease of contact.• Reliability: refers to the consistency of performance.• Responsiveness: the willingness and readiness in providing services.• Credibility: it is a measure of trustworthiness, believability, and honesty.• Security: freedom from risk and/or danger.

3. Framework of Analysis

Figure 1 presents the conceptual framework that summarizes relationships among variablesconsidered in the study.

The main concept behind this framework is that companies make efforts to build an organizationalculture and to put actions in practice to become resilient systems (box on the left). The effects of suchactions can be measured and expressed by resilience indicators (central box) that have the purpose ofinterpreting the effects in seven resilience dimensions, which have an impact on maintaining servicequality after a disruption (box on the right).

Logically, not all the elements of a resilient system affect an index of resilience, just as not allresilience indices affect a service feature. The following Table 1 summarizes the relationship betweenresilience characteristics and resilience dimensions, as emerging from the literature.

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Figure 1. Impact of organizational resilience on service quality preservation.

The main concept behind this framework is that companies make efforts to build an organizational culture and to put actions in practice to become resilient systems (box on the left). The effects of such actions can be measured and expressed by resilience indicators (central box) that have the purpose of interpreting the effects in seven resilience dimensions, which have an impact on maintaining service quality after a disruption (box on the right).

Logically, not all the elements of a resilient system affect an index of resilience, just as not all resilience indices affect a service feature. The following table summarizes the relationship between resilience characteristics and resilience dimensions, as emerging from the literature.

Table 1. Influence of the Elements of Resilient Systems on Resilience Indexes.

Resilience dimensions

Adaptability Reliability Agility Effectiveness Flexibility Recovery Level

Recovery Time

Res

ilien

ce c

hara

cter

istic

s

Anticipation ability

X X X X

Learning from mistakes X X X X X X X

Internal communication X X X X X X

Focus on minor aspects

X X X X X X

Improvisational capabilities X X X X X

Continuous monitoring

X X X X X X

Redundancy X X X X X Simulation X X X X X

Initial vulnerability

X X X X X

The Table highlights how some elements of resilience found in the literature are more influential than others on resilience indexes. Indeed, learning from mistakes affects all seven indexes, and this happens because an organization, in order to be resilient and to survive a malfunction or a crisis,

Figure 1. Impact of organizational resilience on service quality preservation.

Table 1. Influence of the Elements of Resilient Systems on Resilience Indexes.

Resilience Dimensions

Adaptability Reliability Agility Effectiveness Flexibility RecoveryLevel

RecoveryTime

Resiliencecharacteristics

Anticipation ability X X X XLearning from

mistakes X X X X X X X

Internalcommunication X X X X X X

Focus on minor aspects X X X X X XImprovisational

capabilities X X X X X

Continuousmonitoring X X X X X X

Redundancy X X X X XSimulation X X X X X

Initial vulnerability X X X X X

The Table highlights how some elements of resilience found in the literature are more influentialthan others on resilience indexes. Indeed, learning from mistakes affects all seven indexes, and thishappens because an organization, in order to be resilient and to survive a malfunction or a crisis,must be able to draw as much knowledge as possible from mistakes made. This mechanism helps theorganization to face new problems with greater ease or at least having behind it experiences to refer toas a support to decision making.

The anticipation ability affects fewer indexes, but this does not mean it is less important. Knowinghow to anticipate a possible problem is not an easy task, as in most cases, problems are unexpectedand there are no elements that can lead us to foresee them.

On the other hand, an important step toward resilience is acknowledging alarms and revelatorysignals, and attributing them the right importance. For this reason, it is of fundamental importance foran organization to focus on minor aspects, which can hide greater problems and incidents. The role ofhuman resources goes hand in hand with the last element considered. In particular, any employee whobecomes aware of a problem or identifies the first symptoms of malfunctions should communicatethis situation without any reservations. The ability to communicate these problems lies at the baseof a mindful organization. To this extent, an efficient and reliable internal communication system isconfirmed as a key element of a resilient organization, so that information, provisions, and problems

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can be communicated quickly, as well as decisions, in order to stem in advance, or in any case with acertain promptness, any problem that might happen.

Nonetheless, the role and relevance of improvisational capabilities can be crucial when ordinarysystems might fail, or communications might not flow as planned. Indeed, investing in the developmentof these capabilities is essential for companies, since they ensure adaptability, flexibility, and agility,while at the same time allowing companies a certain recovery level and time.

Within a resilient organization, it certainly cannot lack a continuous monitoring system that allowsnot only to assess the gap between what is planned and what is actually being achieved, but also tohighlight any anomaly that may arise and emerge in a system.

Redundancy is based on the concept of having more than one resource/component of the sametype that can perform the same task at disposal. This helps an organization in being resilient, since itallows the replacement of defective components without severe interruptions and breakdowns. On theother hand, problems might arise when malfunctions concern integrated systems, making redundancyalmost useless. To this extent, companies should not underestimate possible threats, and should avoid“feeling safe” because of redundant resources. However, advantages of redundancy are undisputable,and so is its ability in increasing organizational resilience, especially in the face of standard failures.

The simulation of scenarios is a tool of vital importance for an organization that brings radicalinnovations in a system, since it allows making more accurate forecasts and plans based on the resultsobtained. However, these simulation processes represent additional costs for the organization andit might may result in the simulations that are carried out suffering from specific environmentalconditions/assumptions that can invalidate the results.

Concluding, all the features above should be considered in the process of developing resiliencewithin an organization. A key step is fostering change within the organizational culture in order to buildcommitment towards resilience. Furthermore, companies must also invest in tools and mechanismsthat promote resilience. This is also the case, for instance, for redundancy, a key component within anarea of fundamental importance, as well as for simulations and tests.

Looking at the second part of the framework proposed, the following Table 2 reports the relationshipbetween resilience and service quality dimensions.

Table 2. Relationship between resilience and service quality dimensions.

Service Dimensions

Competence Access Reliability Responsiveness Credibility Security

Resiliencedimensions

Adaptability X X X XReliability X X X X X X

Agility X X X XEffectiveness X X X X X

Flexibility X X X XRecovery Level X X XRecovery Time X X X X

As it can be seen from the table, the reliability of the system affects all the six dimensions of serviceand therefore is of vital importance for organizations aiming toward resilience. As a matter of fact,an organization that lacks reliability creates problems of access to services, creating differences betweenwhat is being offered and what is presented, and problems regarding the organization’s responsiveness,as well as its competence to provide services. In addition, credibility and security are closely linked toreliability, since a lack in this aspect can result in a risk for the final customers and cause doubts.

Adaptability is a key requisite for building resilience and ensuring service quality, since knowinghow to cope with environmental changes is very important for organizations as it should be able tomaintain operations in almost all conditions, as well as being able to respond to changes in an uncertainand changing environment.

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Another important feature for an organization is effectiveness. In Table 1, it clearly emergedhow effectiveness is related to all elements of resilient systems, and looking at Table 2, we cansee how effectiveness affects almost all the service dimensions, and therefore we can state thatfor organizations, it is essential to be competent and prepared in carrying out tasks and reachinggoals. Nevertheless, flexibility has some impact on service dimensions, even if its importanceshould be understood in comparison and interaction with other indicators, such as adaptability andresponsiveness, as discussed above.

The recovery level and recovery time are two very important parameters that certify the qualityof an organization. We can state that, when facing a problem, the more a company can recover (level)within the minimum time, the less the service quality evaluation will be affected by it.

4. Results from Model Application

4.1. Case Analysis

The case presented concerns a large European service company that went through a considerableeffort of digital transformation in the last year. This process brought the company to provide itselfwith real-time monitoring and control infrastructure to effectively manage its service provision in acontinuous way, so as to be able to proactively adapt to situations of contingent difficulties and complexevents. To cope with unexpected events, the central control system was coupled with a control roomthat allows the verification, in real time, of the regular ongoing activities and processes.

This renovation process continued on expanding the document management services, whichguarantees, for example, the management of the documentation needed for sales automation processesand contracting processes. Furthermore, the company created a multi-channel platform on which toconvey all the organization’s distribution channels.

Nonetheless, the company faced a serious malfunctioning that undermined the functionality ofthe overall infrastructure, causing non-negligible problems and losses of service. At the origin ofthis malfunctioning, there were some anomalies in the central system that manages all the servicesprovided, which then propagated to almost all terminals of the company. Among the main causes,the company acknowledged a serious system bug caused by an update, together with inefficienciesand inadequacies of their platforms and infrastructure. However, this unforeseen event caused severaldays of malfunctioning and shut-downs to hundreds of the company’s front offices.

Although the company shared emergency indications and procedures with its peripheral officesand business units, these could not manage to restore operations at an acceptable level without theintervention of a central crisis unit, and many times, interventions required a complete closure andshutdown of the systems. To restore the situation, actions undertaken concerned a full restart ofthe information systems and applications, inhibition of some critical functionalities, and a reset ofconfiguration parameters when needed, but real corrective actions to the problem started only after thethird day of malfunctioning.

The management of this critical event was carried out through a series of articulated actions, whichincluded: constant monitoring support, development of specific procedures to assist peripheral officesand guarantees of continuity of service provision, extension of opening hours, and the establishmentof a task force dedicated to handling the problem. Furthermore, technical solutions undertakenrequired 100% of available IT resources, plus the use of secondary emergency systems. Obviously,these malfunctioning and IT problems impacted severely on the quality of service provided, resultingin a lack of trust from clients and a serious reputational loss for the company. We gathered data fromdifferent sources in order to be able to analyze the six dimensions of service evaluation of the modelproposed. To analyze performance in terms of competence, access, and reliability, we analyzed datafrom around 20,000 customers’ opinions (over almost 1,500,000 customers during malfunctioning days)from the company’s support website. To evaluate responsiveness, we could analyze data provided bythe company. The average waiting time was evaluated with reference to a day without malfunctions

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in the critical period. The last two aspects of credibility and security were evaluated by analyzingcontent from Google News. The analysis was carried out by cataloguing all the articles publishedon the internet that contained the name of the organization combined with other keywords, such asthe technical assistance company, inefficiencies, problems, inconveniences, closure, reimbursement,quality, and trust. Therefore, what emerged for the six areas was:

• Competence: what emerged from data is that almost 6% of customers claimed a lack ofprofessionalism and professional capacity shown by employees, with an increase of 13% ofunsatisfied customers compared to normal functioning periods.

• Access: more than 20% of customers spoke negatively about this point, manifesting discomfortdue to excessive waiting times, with an increase of 63% of unsatisfied clients when compared tonormal situations.

• Reliability: 2.5% of customers declared that services were not provided at all, while another 5.5%declared to be disappointed with the low level of service provided by the company, showing anincrease of 46%.

• Responsiveness: throughout malfunctioning periods, the average waiting time exhibited anincrease of 222%, to reduce to 58% in the first days following the incident.

• Credibility: from the analysis of contents, emerged an increase in the number of articles concerningthe company by almost 300%, with an increase of negative comments about the company of1665%; furthermore, 55% of articles attributed the responsibility for malfunctioning directly to thecompany, while the remaining 45% blamed the technical assistance company.

• Security: similarly, the increase of negative comments and opinions concerning the securityprovided the company raised by 818% during the malfunctioning period.

The Table 3 below summarizes the severity of the malfunctioning from service evaluation.

Table 3. Impact of malfunctioning on six dimensions of service quality.

Dimension Indicators Measure Variation Impact Severity

Competence Professionalism ofemployees

No. negativeevaluations/No. ofresponding clients

+13% Low

Access Perception of waitingtime

No. negativeevaluations/No. ofresponding clients

+63% High

Reliability Lack of serviceNo. negative

evaluations/No. ofresponding clients

+46% High

Responsiveness Average waiting time Average waiting time +222% Severe

Credibility Negative comments onmedia

No. negative comments inthe period +84% Average

Security Negative comments onmedia

No. negative comments inthe period +818% Severe

4.2. Resilient Assessment

In this section, we are going to analyze the effects of the incident on service evaluation in detail,and then put them in correlation with the elements of a resilient system. The aim is to validate themodel proposed, by analyzing if, in relation to a low performance in terms of service evaluation,there had been a lack of commitment and investment in terms of resilience.

The analysis has been focused on evaluating the presence of organizational resilience elements andhow these have been implemented in the case considered. For each of these elements, a judgement hasbeen expressed on the following qualitative scale: inadequate, insufficient, sufficient, good, or excellent.

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4.2.1. Resilience Indexes

The organization implemented the procedures foreseen for emergency situations, adapting tothe malfunction of the central system. The changes to normal procedures are a clear signal thatsomething did not work at its best and therefore the organization’s ability to adapt to the emergencyand contingent situation was not optimal. The judgement on the adaptability of the organization wastherefore insufficient. Furthermore, for what concerns reliability, the organization tried to guaranteethe service by extending the time without interrupting it. Even if the inconveniences for customerswere greater, in the end, the organization carried out a number of transactions that are comparable tonormal periods of operation. For these reasons, the judgement on the reliability of the organizationis sufficient.

The ability to respond to changes can be assessed by taking into consideration the overallassessment of the characteristics of the service. Looking at clients’ evaluations of discomfort experienced,we can see how on average, the severity of inefficiencies had a considerable impact. For this reason,the organization’s judgement for what concerns agility is inadequate.

The organization reached almost the same volume of transactions that it would have achieved ina normal period of operation. On this point; however, a relevant observation must be made, servicetimes were extended and employees had to work beyond normal office hours to ensure an acceptableservice level to clients. The judgement on effectiveness is sufficient, even if it is not possible to fullyassess the achievement of the company’s goals.

The term flexibility takes into account two aspects: the ability of an organization to cope with avariation in demand and the ability to offer different services with the same system without makingnumerous changes. One of the reasons that led to the malfunction was the increased workload.According to the organization, the central system had been sized to withstand a load similar to thatexperienced throughout the period of malfunctioning. Considering that the increase in workload wasone of the possible causes of the malfunctioning and that the organization had not been able to provideall the services offered, the judgement on the flexibility of the organization is insufficient.

The organization managed to recover to the initial level. In fact, as mentioned above, the volumeof transactions during the malfunction was comparable to the level of a normal operational day. This ispossible because the organization devoted a considerable effort to restore an acceptable service level.Unfortunately, malfunctions had serious effects and repercussions even when the system was notexperiencing problems, and also during the following days of restoration. Therefore, considering thatthe company could ensure a good recovery level in the first following days, the judgement expressedis therefore sufficient.

Looking at recovery time, the malfunction had a total duration of 7 hours over a whole workingweek. The recovery was followed by two milder periods of malfunction. On average, if we consider sixdays of work, the malfunction caused about an hour and ten minutes of inactivity per day. However,seven days of malfunctioning represent a fairly long period and therefore the assessment of the recoverytime is insufficient.

All the evaluations on resilience characteristics are summarized in the following Table 4, wherewe highlighted the worst resilience dimensions impacting on the most severe service dimensions.

Many service features had a high impact on customers. From the average value line in Table 4,it can be seen how almost all the evaluations on the resilience indexes are lower than the sufficiencyvalue. As pointed out in the previous sections, these resilience indexes express the effectiveness ofresilience measures and characteristics on service dimensions and therefore on the judgement of clients.The malfunction experienced by customers resulted in a negative opinion about service evaluation,as confirmed by the analysis provided at the beginning of this section (paragraph 4.1). Indeed, thisanalysis shows that the severity of the impact is on average high for all service dimensions. If wecombine this result with those emerging from the analysis of resilience, it can be said that there may beupstream. In particular, the average value of the resilience indexes is insufficient and therefore thequality of the service is affected.

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Table 4. Comparison between Resilience Indexes and Service Dimensions. Worst evaluationsare highlighted.

Service Dimensions

Competence Access Reliability Responsiveness Credibility Security

Impact severity Low High High Severe Average Severe

Resiliencedimensions

Adaptability Insufficient Insufficient Insufficient InsufficientReliability Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient

Agility Inadequate Inadequate Inadequate InadequateEffectiveness Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient

Flexibility Insufficient Insufficient Insufficient InsufficientRecovery Level Sufficient Sufficient SufficientRecovery Time Insufficient Insufficient Insufficient Insufficient

4.2.2. Elements of Resilient Systems

In this section, we want to analyze, in a backward perspective, how good the resilience measuresthe company put into action were. By crossing the evaluation of these measures with the averageevaluations on resilience indexes (deriving from service evaluation), we can assess the meaningfulnessof the framework proposed.

From the analysis of the company’s history (derived from archival documents), a malfunction ofthese proportions was not expected, nor had the company ever faced something of this proportionbefore. The organization was not able to anticipate the problem, nor was it able to take the rightprecautions to avoid it. The new central system had been designed so as to be able to support veryhigh workloads; however, a malfunctioning of this severity had not been taken into account. For thisreason, the anticipation ability of the organization can be evaluated as insufficient.

The organization already experienced a similar malfunctioning a year before, albeit with a reducedscale and severity. During this period, part of the system had been modified, but still the organizationitself did not know whether the two events could be connected to each other. From the organization’sdeclarations, it emerges that following this past event, emergency procedures were not changed,just modified. The organization should be able to better learn from its mistakes and change the centralsystem so that a similar problem will not happen again in the future. The judgement on the ability tolearn from mistakes is insufficient.

The internal communication by the organization during the period of malfunctioning was carriedout by means of e-mails, text messages, and phone calls. The communications, according to theoperators of the organization, were imminent and sudden and all under the control of the service controlroom that monitored the system 24 hours a day and gave indications of what to do. The judgement oninternal communication is therefore good.

Before the organization had a malfunction, there had been a series of minor episodes, which werehiding a bigger problem. According to company’s statements, these episodes and warning signals hadbeen underestimated. Greater attention would have allowed the organization to be ready to face thecrisis. The company completely missed this point, and therefore the judgement can only be inadequate.

Most decisions made by the organization were based on emergency procedures. These proceduresmade it possible to limit a further escalation of the emergency. From statements made by theorganization, it would seem that little had been done using improvisational capabilities. Nonetheless,according to different reports, several minor cases and crises within individual offices had beenmanaged independently by employees, exhibiting non-negligible improvisational capabilities. For theabove reasons, this aspect of organizational resilience culture can be evaluated as sufficient.

From the declarations released by the organization, it emerged that there was not a real system forcontinuous monitoring. In other words, the technical support company that managed the informationsystem had its own control system, but it was not integrated with that of the organization. Furthermore,the two companies did not communicate the results of the analyses among themselves. When aproblem occurred, the organization submitted it to the support company that solved it and did not

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provide any feedback to the organization. So, in this sense, there was no real central system to carry ona continuous monitoring effort. The organization managed its offices through the service control room,but that did not allow it to have an overall view of the system. The same statements indicate that therewas a request from the organization to the assistance company to provide an integrated monitoringsystem. The evaluation of the continuous monitoring system is therefore insufficient.

The central system of the organization was composed of a primary system and a secondary systemthat replaces the first one in case of malfunction. Behind the malfunctions experienced; however,there was a misalignment of data between these two systems. In this case, the redundancy of thecomponents did not help the organization to avoid the problem, but perhaps it could be one of thecauses that determined its severity. The judgement on redundancy therefore suffers from the fact thatin this case, it did not bring any benefit, resulting in an insufficient judgement.

Looking at the simulation processes, intended as system functionality tests, this aspect willencounter a negative judgement. Indeed, the new system was put into operation without beingtested on a large scale, and in particular without testing a high load capacity. A more accuratetest system and greater scenario simulation would have allowed the organization to mitigate themalfunction, furthermore it would have provided the company with more accurate emergencyprocedures. The judgement is therefore inadequate.

The organization, as mentioned above, was largely exposed to possible problems, failures,and malfunctions because the new system was put into operation without adequate tests. This isprobably due to the greater importance given to commercial interests, instead of the system’sfunctionality. Consequently, the judgement of the initial vulnerability state is sufficient, which actuallyexpresses a considerable level of exposure for the company.

Table 5 summarizes the evaluations and compares them with average values of resilience indexes.In Table 5 we highlighted the main causes that, according to the model, mostly affected negative

performance in terms of resilience (expressed by the evaluations in the first line), which in turn affectedservice dimensions. We can see, for instance, how an insufficient performance in terms of anticipationability affected the organizations’ capabilities in terms of adaptability, flexibility, and recovery time.On the other hand, we can also state that the negative agility outcomes were mostly due to insufficientredundancy and inadequate simulation efforts.

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Table 5. Evaluation of the Elements of Resilient Systems and Resilience Indexes. Worst evaluations are highlighted.

Resilience Dimensions

Adaptability Reliability Agility Effectiveness Flexibility Recovery Level Recovery Time

Insufficient Sufficient Inadequate Sufficient Insufficient Sufficient Insufficient

Resiliencecharacteristics

Anticipation ability Insufficient Insufficient Insufficient InsufficientLearning from mistakes Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient SufficientInternal communication Good Good Good Good Good GoodFocus on minor aspects Inadequate Inadequate Inadequate Inadequate Inadequate Inadequate

Improvisational capabilities Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient SufficientContinuous monitoring Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient

Redundancy Insufficient Insufficient Insufficient Insufficient InsufficientSimulation Inadequate Inadequate Inadequate Inadequate Inadequate

Initial vulnerability Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient Sufficient

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5. Conclusions

Resilience is a key attribute for companies, vital for companies in order to secure business and itssustainability/continuity, while maintaining competitiveness. Some of the actions indicated to buildresilience, like for instance continuous monitoring, improvisational capabilities, and anticipation abilitycan bring value in different business areas and functions, and not simply just contribute to buildingand developing resilience.

The model presented in this work has the aim of providing guidance from different points of view:

1. It gives indications and suggestions on which are the most interesting and valuable areas to focuson while configuring organizations as resilient systems.

2. It puts in correlation the concept of organizational resilience with service quality preservation,showing where companies should concentrate most to secure business and maintaincompetitiveness at the same time.

The model proposed can therefore be a useful tool in supporting resilience planning and actionsof improvement. Furthermore, through the analysis of a real case, we provided evidence of how themodel can be applied in a backward perspective to understand fault modes of specific events. In thisway, it is possible to have a better understanding of incidents, their intrinsic dynamics, and seek forimprovements Doing so, this model can become a resilience tool itself, contributing to learning frommistakes and in understanding minor events that might have been underestimated in the past.

However, the research has some limitations, especially the use of a single case for model testingand validating, and the use of what can be a large number of variables.

Future research works should adopt a wider variety of cases, in order to test and confirm thevalidity of the tool in different contexts and industries, to see whether its applicability is still effective,or if there are some contextual factors that might impose changes and loss of meaning to some aspectsand variables.

Author Contributions: Conceptualization, A.A., B.C. and F.N.; methodology, A.A., B.C. and F.N.; validation, A.A.,B.C. and F.N.; formal analysis, A.A., B.C. and F.N.; investigation, A.A., B.C. and F.N.; data curation, A.A., B.C. andF.N.; writing—original draft preparation, A.A., B.C. and F.N.; writing—review and editing, A.A., B.C. and F.N.;visualization, A.A., B.C. and F.N.; supervision, B.C. and F.N. All authors have read and agreed to the publishedversion of the manuscript.

Funding: This research received no external funding.

Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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